Watching a man on a stand-up paddle board be surrounded by dolphins at Bondi Beach, from the cliffs above.

Many nights of laughter with friends, just to capture the moment.

Seeing the sunset over Charlotte’s skyline from the middle of a traffic jam

And something I never thought I would see, a squirrel sitting in the middle of the road eating Bojangles!

~

I kid you not, a ballsy little squirrel was sitting in the street with both paws around a biscuit and a packet of Bojangles seasoned-fries. I had to give him a little toot in my car because he would would NOT move! Finally he upped and carried his lunch to the sidewalk, where he sat back down and resumed his munching.

What does this mean?

I should never leave my house without a phone or camera.

Michael Moore will release Fast Food Animal Nation in the fall of 2011.

The next Man vs Wild will see Bear Grylls holding his own in a chain restaurant.

Following this experience it seemed only natural to watch Supersize Me & Food Inc. I was hoping to learn whether rodents prefer drive through or counter service.

~

Instead I was bombarded with a distressing reality check. Kids as young as 4 and 5 are being diagnosed with diabetes. Chickens are being pumped so hard with steroids that their little legs can’t support their overgrown bodies. And poor Alexandra Jameison (vegan chef) had to sleep with a man who consumed nothing but McDonalds for 30 days…shudder.

~

If everyone ate more vegetables the kids would be fit and carefree, Sunday lunch wouldn’t be the result of a science experiment, and Alexandra Jameison would have better sex.

There is this great raw food restaurant in Charlotte called Luna’s Living Kitchen. It is second-to-none. They have this one dish called Lunasagne, which is layers of raw zucchini ‘pasta’ with sundried tomatoes, cashew nut cheese and crimini mushrooms.

I have had some beautiful zucchini from our vegetable garden recently so I thought I would turn my hand to a similar dish, using a filling of nuts and sundried tomatoes and topping it with a cashew-beetroot ‘cheese’.

~

Now if I could just get some to that squirrel ….

~

Raw ‘meaty lasagne’

~

Slice 2 zucchini lengthways using a mandolin

Use the grating attachment in a food processor to grate 2 carrots. Set aside. 1 beetroot.

In a blender, mix a handful of walnuts, 2 tbl sundried tomatoes, the carrot and 1 tbl coconut oil until chunky. Set aside

Next process 1/2 cup cashews and enough water to make a smooth consistency. Add the grated beetroot.

In a glass square dish make a single layer of zucchini ‘pasta’. Add 1/2 nut topping and another layer off zucchini. Add remaining nut topping, final layer of zucchini and top with beetroot cheese and a sprinkle of chia seeds.

‘The hottest day of the summer so far was drawing to a close and a drowsy silence lay over the large, square houses of Privet Drive.’

The words that started an empire.

I read my first Harry Potter book, The Chamber of Secrets, when I was 13 years old, three years after ThePhilosopher’s Stone had hit bookshelves but before Potter Mania had engulfed the world. From that moment the spell was cast and I devoured book after book in quick succession. It wasn’t until page 640 in book number four, The Goblet of Fire, that I had to learn patience. Slow months went by as I awaited the release of Prisoner of Azkaban, my young mind nearly exploding in anticipation of what the Hogwarts crew was up to.

And so it goes with many of the great series.

It was late December 2001, I was coming out of the cinema after watching the first Lord Of The Rings film with the Batman and my dad. The clock had just gone 3pm yet the temperature outside still sat on 42˚C (c.100F). I was on a little sugar high from choc-tops and Maltesers and the back of my legs had gone to sleep about an hour prior. Standing in the carpark, without words at the AWESOMENESS that was LOTR, Batman and I thought we would absolutely die if we had to wait an entire year for the next installment.

It was 1999, the streets were drowning in rain, I was 11. We were at a coastal town, having enjoyed breakfast at a seaside cafe watching the storm punish the nearby sand. Batman wanted to get back to the hotel where he would have access to cable. Unfortunately for Batman it was nice weather for Ducks and chickens to trawl second hand bookstores and antique shops in search of the next volume of Trixie Belden, my favourite all-time series, first published in 1948 and not easily accessible at the local library or bookstore. Store after store after store until finally we came upon a man selling rocking horses and old books.

It was mere weeks ago when separation anxiety once again reared its ugly head. NB and I had been loyal followers of the HBO series Game of Thrones, staying up past my bedtime each Sunday evening until the final nail-biting episode. Again, an entire year must go past before I will be reacquainted with those friends.

Now, you may ask what on earth all this talk has to do with pirate cupcakes? Good question!

Another series that has spanned nearly a decade is Pirates Of The Caribbean. While I enjoyed the first POTC, very much actually, it wasn’t one of those “ARE THEY REALLY MAKING ME WAIT FOR THE SEQUEL…” kind of films.

Yep, you heard right. Toenails. O.P.I has released a Pirates of the Caribbean range and I loved their jeweled, ocean green lacquer. A combination of blue and yellow food colouring and I think I got pretty close!

Some months ago I wrote part one of Pennsylvania. It seems such a distant memory with all that has happened and perhaps it is too far gone to go into any great detail. I guess, all in all, there were just a couple of things that I wanted you to see:

This Saturday past we travelled up to Raleigh for a wedding. Considering that the weather was sweltering I had packed a bag with a pretty light summer dress, a pair of strappy sandals and a hundred pins to sling up my hair and keep my neck cool. Makeup would be bare summer essentials: bronzer, clear lipgloss, mascara. The next day I would have a fresh change of shirt and shorts for the drive home. How cool, calm and collected did I sound?

That was until we were driving into Chapel Hill, two hours from home, when I turned to NB and asked:

“Did you put my bag in the car?”

NB: “Did you ask me to?”

BS: “No….ohh gosh!!”

I had a mental image of my overnight bag sitting on our bed beneath the ceiling fan and light that I also didn’t turn off (add electricity bill woes to wardrobe disaster!)

NB looked and me and I looked at NB. NB looked down at the (now unflatteringly sweaty) skirt, singlet and flip flops that I was wearing and I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

NB: “How did you forget your bag?”

And this is where food comes into the story, once again addling my brain and dominating my attention.

BS: “I was hungry and decided to make a smoothie before we left…I brought the smoothie with me at least!” I said, holding up a long empty glass. “It was delicious!”

Luckily NB saw the funny side and was happy to make a detour into Macy’s. I’m not adept at clothes shopping on a good day but under a time constraint with the thought of appropriate wedding attire hovering over my head, talk about pressure! It was on like Kong. 10 minutes, a knee length blue dress and a pair of wedges later and we were back out the door. And thank goodness for RH, who hooked me up with makeup, shampoo, jewelry and all the other essentials. Beware, having me as a house-guest may result in a raid on your bathroom cabinet!

But as they say, all’s well that ends well. The wedding was beautiful, full of song and beauty and love, good food and fine company. As for my little faux pas, if I had the time again I probably would still choose the smoothie. It was just really good.

I have spoken before about my addiction to cookbooks and how it was a heartbreaking experience to part with so many of my hardback-bound friends when I moved to America. While I miss flicking through Neil Perry’s Simply Asian and Georgio Locatelli’s Italian Bible: Made In Italy I am happy to report that they have both found a comfortable home with The Duck.

This isn’t to say that I left them all behind. I decided that as an Australian arriving in the Southern states of America I would need such classics as: Food We Love (AWW), 5 Of The Best (delicious magazine), the perfect cookbook I & II (David Herbert) and Simple Essentials: beef, lamb, pork (Donna Hay). Since arriving I have also acquired two Paula Deen cookbooks (Paula Deen’s kitchen classics & Paula Deen and friends), thanks to a lovely dinner guest who generously gave me her own copies, as well as three second hand copies of the Carolina’s version of CWA recipe books.

So it would be frivolous and unnecessary to say I need another cookbook.

But I reeeeaaalllly want this one – Man With A Pan: Culinary Adventures Of Fathers Who Cook For Their Families. This collection of stories and recipes was brainstormed and edited by John Donohue, the blogger behind Stay At Stove Dadand well-known editor for ‘Going Ons About Town’ in the New Yorker . I’m yet to get my hands on a copy but basically Donohue has gathered fathers from across the realm – think everyone from Stephen King and celebrity chef Mario Batali, to a fireman in Brooklyn and a bond trader in LA – and had them share their food memories and favourite dish.

For reviews on the book you can read here and here and check out this Q&A with Donohue here.

I can’t wait until this book is sitting on my kitchen table and what a better gift for Father’s Day (June 19)… wives, mothers, daughters, this will be the gift that keeps on giving!

I don’t have a great memory, I never really have. Studying for my final school exams I must have made at least 100 identical copies of my notes in an attempt to carve the words into my brain. And it worked. For the next week I could have told you anything about Australian troops in Vietnam, flawlessly quoted the exisentialist tragicomedy that is Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, talked my way around a Japanese dinner table and written a business plan for a company up to their eyebrows in debt. Unfortunately as soon as I had submitted the papers all of that information fell out my ears.

Clarence River at dusk

“We’re more of the love, blood, and rhetoric school. Well, we can do you blood and love without the rhetoric, and we can do you blood and rhetoric without the love, and we can do you all three concurrent or consecutive. But we can’t give you love and rhetoric without the blood. Blood is compulsory. They’re all blood, you see” … (thank goodness for Google!)

Sho & Eiichiro at a school in Tochigi Prefecture

But one thing I am good at is sensory memory. As food lovers we would all experience how taste can take us back to another time, another place. For me the taste of Weetbix with cold milk reminds me of eating midnight cereal with my Dad. The taste of Weetbix with hot water and warm milk reminds me of breakfast with my Aunt and her rascals with the pleasant musty smell hay in the air and the promise of sweet Blue Ribbon ice-cream. A crunchy peanut butter & Vegemite sandwich is synonymous with after-school snacks at my Nan’s kitchen table and any strange combination of ingredients under grilled cheese on toast is me as a young girl sitting at the farm and eyeing my plate with scepticism. Never again will I be able to eat sweet potato with tahini without remembering BR’s kitchen table and her mum’s spring vegetable pasta.

But it’s not only taste, but scent, auditory, tactile and visual.

The smell of star jasmine and honeysuckle is springtime back home and the touch of burning hot asphalt on sun-toughened feet takes me back to beachside holidays, especially when paired with the ice cream truck melody. The jingle of keys, wallets and lipsticks in a large handbag remind me of the thrill of going through my grandmother’s purse every time I saw her, the world of the grown woman was exciting beyond belief. Panic At The Disco will always be linked in my memory with The Batman circa 2008, and Boom Boom Pow is peddling my heart out in a spin class in 2010, watching the massive thighs of the instructor and expecting to die.

Skywriting on a Sunday in Bellevue Hill, Sydney

It’s funny the things that make you remember: the smell of leather shoes, a frosty nose and dragon’s breath, fluorescent lights in a city train station, Kings Of Leon, burnt toast. I can’t explain it and I can’t control it. I also can’t predict what memories will be created from what I’m hearing, tasting, touching and smelling now in 2011, in North Carolina, at 23.

Born to be a foodie, Seaworld 1992

Just something to think about. Tell me Blushers, what makes you remember?